making friends

first week of school!
molly started a 3-day-a-week mothers day out on wednesday at the academy at our church, and i started homeschool with colby that same day.
i love the curriculum i'm using and he's enjoying it, too, so i'm really excited about our year together!!
molly did great, too. her favorite things are playing on the playground and lunch. shes definitely allens daughter. :-)

i went saturday morning to the welcome brunch for the co-op i'll be taking colby to on fridays. he's taking three classes and i'll be helping out in a couple and teaching p.e. for the k-2nd graders. we start sept 10th.

last night when i was giving colby his bath i mentioned something about him making a lot of new friends when he starts co-op, and he said
colby: "i know how to make friends, now."
me: "you do? how?"
colby: "first, you ask them their name, which i forget to do sometimes. then, you ask them if they want to be your friend. if they say no, you just walk away, but if they say yes then you ask them if they want to play with you."
me: "what if they say yes they want to be your friend but they dont want to play with you."
colby: "well then, you ask them if they'd like to sit down and watch some t.v. with you."
me: "and what if they say no to that?"
colby: "hmm...maybe they dont want to be your friend after all."

i remember the days of running up to someone and asking "do you want to be my friend?" they usually said yes, but if i got the occasional no, i'd shrug and go try again with someone else. things were some much simpler then. i wonder what kind of reaction i'd get if i did that today. hahaha!!

a little bit of tattling

we've been dealing with tattle telling around here a lot lately. trying to explain when its necessary and when it needs to be worked out on their own. sometimes they'll come and tattle before even attempting to work it out themselves.
we've started to be able to tell when thats why the're coming to us. we can just hear it in the way they say, "moommmmyyy," or "daaadddy."

the other day colby and molly were playing in colby's room and allen and i were in the kitchen getting dinner cleaned up. colby comes in and says
colby: "daaaddddyyyyy,"
allen: "wait. are you tattling?"
colby: "no, i'm just telling you that mol...."
allen: "are you tattling?"
colby: "no."
allen: "are you sure?"
colby: "well....just a little tattling."
allen: "no, colby. you dont tattle just a little. you're either tattling or you're not. do you want just a little poison, or no poison?"
colby: "no poison. well......what kind of poison is it?"
allen: "whats the most poisonous kind?"
me: "arsenic!"
allen: "arsenic."
colby: "whats it look like?"
allen: "its clear."
sidenote: we dont know what the most poisonous kind of poison is, nor do we know what arsenic looks like.
colby: "like water! i'll have just a little."
allen: "no! you wont have just a little. it will kill you. its poison. and we dont want just a little tattling either."
and we've come full circle. i'm not sure how we got there, or that it made any sense, and we definitely got off on a rabbit trail, but i'm mildly confidant the point was made.
and thats the most we can hope for at this point in the game.

bedtime prayers

tonight i was putting the kids to bed, and they wanted to say prayers together.
we sat in a circle on the floor in colbys room and held hands.
i thanked God for the day and for my kids, that He would watch over us and give us good rest tonight. i also thanked Him for a great day of church and learning about Him and His Son. i specifically said
me: "thank you that we get to go to church, because there are so many people in the world that dont get to do that like we do."
when i got done praying i opened my eyes and colby was scrunching his face up at me. he looked angry or something, and i was expecting him to say something like "i dont like praying" or something that would result in me telling him to be thankful, etc, etc.
instead this is what happened
me: "colby, whats wrong?"
colby: "you didnt pray that you're sorry those people dont have churches. you just said thank you that we have one."
colby hasn't been wanting to pray lately, like out loud on his own, so i seized the opportunity and said
me: "well, then why dont you pray for that."
colby: "ok, lets hold hands again. dear God, thank you for the bugs and sea animals and i pray that no one would step on any bugs and squish them, even by accident. and i'm sorry for the people that dont have churches. amen."
me: "why dont you pray for them to have churches?"
colby: "what?"
me: "instead of just being sorry that they cant go to church, how about you pray that they can?"
colby: "oh, ok!....and i pray for the people that dont have churches to go to that you would send workers to build them churches. amen."
me: "amen. thank you colby, that was a very good prayer!"
molly: "i want to pray!"
me: "ok, go ahead."
molly: "dear God, i hope that no princesses get squished. i hope that the fairy godmother doesnt turn cinderella into another fairy godmother, because she needs to be cinderella. i hope that colby doesnt ride on any sea animals because that would be very dangerous. and i pray that no sharks would eat us. and i hope that we can have a sea animal cage filled with lots of fish and things, but not any jellyfish cause they sting. and keep us safe. and thank you for our church, and please give workers to the people that dont have churches so the workers can build them a church. amen."
me: "thank you molly! i love it when you pray!"

its not very often that my kids pray willingly. we're still trying to help them understand that you dont have to pray a certain way, you just say whats on your heart. they always want us to let them repeat after us, or they just dont want to pray out loud at all.
this was such a sweet time, and i always get a little laugh out of what molly comes up with.

goodnight!!

my boys growing up!

we've had quite a bit of excitement around here the past couple of days.

i found out monday that i got a part in Cinderella (same theatre where i've done all my other shows). i will be one of the stepsisters and one of my very best friends is cinderella. we've never done a show together, so we're so excited to get this chance!! i'm pumped about the part. when i was grace farrell in annie, well, she's just so sweet and soft spoken. i'm looking forward to being rude and obnoxious. i'm even supposed to have a loud horrible laugh with a snort at the end. pretty awesome.

even more exciting news; colby lost his first tooth on monday (monday was a big day for us)!!! the tooth fairy of course came to visit him and left him some money which he promptly deposited in his bank. he's his fathers son. i would have had that money spent before the tooth fairy had a chance to leave it!

the tooth next to the one he lost is loose, too, so it wont be long before he has a large hole right in the bottom center of his mouth. i love his new smile, but it reminds me that he's growing up. bittersweet.

we were at target the other day and he saw a baby pool and said, "mommy, baby pools are lame."

i was impressed that he used 'lame' correctly (probably thanks to the teenagers he's around at church all the time), and once again reminded that he's not a baby anymore.

he also told me that he's "pretty into rap music".

Lord, help me.

dinner conversation

first of all, let me address the blog picture.
i changed it a few days ago to one of the kids going down an inflatable water slide. they ewre in their underwear, and one of my friends sent me a text about my blog picture being risque. i know he was kidding (love ya, buddy) because thats what he does, but i wasnt crazy about the picture anyway. it was kind of blurry and too big for the page, so i took it down. my kids just havent been very photogenic lately. i have a few of them individually, but i feel like i have to post a picture of both of them or i'm playing favorites. i have two kids, not one. is that dumb?
anyway, so i thought i would make all you ladies jealous and put this one up for now. yes thats beth moore in the middle. thats pam, my pastors wife, on the right. this was taken at the top of masada in israel.
i promise i'll work on getting an awesomely adorable and fitting picture of my kids, but in the meantime this is what you have to look at. :-)

tonight at the dinner table colby said
colby: "when i get big i want to dance like a mexican."
me: (so. many. questions.) "why do you have to wait till you get big?"
colby: "because i have to learn it."
me: "and how do they dance?"
colby: "well, i know one of their dance moves."
me: "and what is that?"
colby: "you twirl and then grab a flower in your teeth and say 'voila!'"
me: "you mean ole'?"
colby: "oh yeah. thats it. OLE'!!"

a week at camp

allen is camp director for two weeks at a camp down near corpus this year.
we usually take our youth group there, but this year we went somewhere else, so this is two extra weeks on top of youth camp and mission trip.
that being said, allen asked if the kids and i would come one of the weeks and hang out so we could still kind of be together.
the kids and i had our own room (allens was two doors down) and pretty much did our own thing most of the week. a couple of the "band wives" were there and one of them has a little boy whos four, so he's right between colby and molly. the three of them had a great time playing together. that was a blessing because it rained most of wednesday and thursday, so the kids were able to keep each other entertained indoors.
this place we were at had SO. MANY. BUGS. colby was in paradise!
i dont know if there were more this year than in years past or if i was noticing them because colby pointed them out constantly. constantly.
caterpillars (crazy looking ones!), cicadas, moths, ants, dung beetles, crickets, grasshoppers, earthworms, toads and frogs (not bugs, but still cool), bombardier beetles, click beetles, lady bugs, doodle bugs, wasps, hornets....and thats just off the top of my head. i'm sure i could think of more if i sat here long enough.
my mom (she was one of the Bible study leaders so she was there too) and colby came up with this idea of starting a bug show where colby would pick one bug each week and tell us all about it. i could film it and post it on a bug blog. he could become one of those people that gets discovered on youtube and gets his own show on discovery kids or something.
we'll see how that goes.....right now its still just an idea. we dont have very many exciting bugs here in round rock. not in our yard anyway.
on the way home (about a 3 & 1/2 hour drive) molly kept saying
molly: "mommy, are we still where we're at?"
me: "yes molly. we're still where we're at."
molly: [big sigh. full body pout.]
i loved that. it doesnt make any sense. she was basically asking if we were any closer to home. but thats the only way she knew how to phrase it.

the other day, well let me say this first...
sometimes, ok a lot of times, colby will irritate his sister. he wont necessarily start out trying to irritate her, but in the process of him playing or doing whatever it is he's doing, she'll get annoyed and do this screamy, screechy thing that absolutely unnerves me. (we're working on that by the way. the screaming.) however instead of stopping whatever it is that driving her to the potentially glass shattering noise, he keeps on and keeps on.
which makes me say something like
me: "colby! do you want to irritate your sister?
colby: "no."
me: "because thats what you're doing. do you like that noise she's making?"
colby: "no."
me: "then stop irritating her!"
...and back to where i started...the other day we're in the car and they're playing in the backseat (while securely fastened in their booster seats, mind you.) and i hear molly say
molly: "colby! do you want to irritate me? cause thats what you're doing."
except irritate was kind of jumbled, because that word is entirely too big for her three year old mouth.
that girl. i have no words.

so allens back at the camp again this week. then he's home for a week, then off to alaska for mission trip.
i have an audition in a week and a half for cinderella at the theatre. i'm looking forward to it. i think. i havent really thought about a whole lot to be honest. i should probably get on that.

thats whats been going on around these parts.

kid conversations

a friend and former youth is leaving for school in boston in a week, and today we went to a going away lunch for him.
colbys friend becca was there. i've mentioned her on here before. they were in the same mothers day out class almost 2 years ago now. they were 'boyfriend and girlfriend' at the time, but dont see each other much anymore, because shes a year older than he is, so shes in a different class at church and of course they arent in school together. so they've grown apart. yes i realize they're five (therein lies the humor), and yes i'm going somewhere.
so as i was saying, becca was there today, and she and colby found one another and picked up right where they left off. they're both like shrunk down mini adults in the way they talk to each other, and as i was sitting next to them at the table i was cracking up at their conversations.

becca: "how old is molly now, colby?"
colby: "she's three."
becca: "wow! three? and she's that big?!?"
(side note: molly is a perfectly normal sized three year old. just sayin.)
colby: "yeah, i know. and she doesnt even drink that much water."

later i heard this...
colby: "theres a wasp that injects its egg into a grub and when the egg hatches it eats the grub from the inside. i would love to see that in real life some time."
becca: "yeah. that would be pretty cool."

ah, young love.